Dominique Luca (Kenny Johnson) often arm-wrestles to win bets or competitions for charity. In reality, Kenny Johnson was a world-class arm wrestler until he retired from competition in 1995.
S.W.A.T. units are usually called in for hostage situations or to take down heavily-armed perpetrators. The S.W.A.T. unit on this show often perform the duties of regular police officers to allow for more story lines in the series.
Rochelle Aytes plays the girlfriend/wife of Shemar Moore both in Criminal Minds (2005) and in S.W.A.T. (2017).
This is the 3rd iteration of S.W.A.T after the original series S.W.A.T. (1975) and S.W.A.T. (2003), with 3 characters common to all 3, being Daniel "Hondo" Harrelson, Jim Street and David "Deacon" Kaye. A female S.W.A.T. officer named "Chris" is also a reference to the 2003 movie.